AKA In Which Fish Are Worse Than Leeches

Rey landed on her feet in the middle of the TARDIS console room with the distinct feeling that she had missed something. The Doctor sat in the harness seat on the lower level, doing some welding work. Amy paced nervously on the higher floor, and Rory was caught between shock and anger. It must've been early for them because Amy jumped back and yelped when she appeared. She was still drenched from the swamp she'd been dragged into just moments ago.

Rory stared at her, amazed that a girl had just appeared out of thin air in front of him. Very early days, then.

"Rey!"

The Doctor dropped what he was doing and bounded up the stairs to greet her. She went to wave at him, then cut the action short and brought her hand up to cover her nose and mouth as she sneezed. It felt colder in the TARDIS than usual, and her damp clothes weren't helping any.

Something warm was draped over her shoulders. She looked up to see the Doctor sans jacket, then looked down to the see it on her instead.

"Thank you."

He beamed.

Amy huffed and crossed her arms.

"Right, where were we? Oh! The life out there, it dazzles. I mean, it blinds you to the things that are important. I've seen it devour relationships and plans…" Something sparked beneath the console. He waved it off. "Ohhh! It's meant to do that… because for one person to have seen all that, to taste the glory and then go back, it will tear your apart. So… I'm sending you somewhere. Together."

"Whoa! What, like a date?"

He nodded. "Anywhere you want, anytime you want. One condition—it has to be amazing. The Moulin Rouge in 1890! The first Olympic Games! Not the Titanic—that was a disaster both times. Think of it as a wedding present, because, frankly, it's either this or tokens."

"Are you okay," Rey asked Rory. He had moved passed shock but was still looking a bit stunned.

"It's a lot to take in, isn't it," the Doctor asked. "Tiny box, huge room inside. What's that about? Let me explain."

"It's another dimension," Rory stated plainly.

"It's basically another dimen… What?"

"After Prisoner Zero—" he paid no mind to the Doctor's attempts to get him to stop— "I've been reading up on all the latest scientific theories: FTL travel, parallel universes."

Prisoner Zero… that sounded vaguely familiar. Her memory for the spoken word wasn't as sharp as it was for the written, but she was fairly sure she had heard that name before. Maybe the Doctor had let it slip in passing? That was probably it.

"I like the bit when someone says, 'it's bigger on the inside!' I always look forward to that." He pouted.

"So this date," Amy said, getting them back on topic. "I'm kind of done with running down corridors. What do you think, Rory?"

"How about somewhere… romantic?"

Rey went to change while the Doctor set the TARDIS in motion, coming out in a fresh pair of jeans, a thin sweater worn over a thermal shirt, and her signature gloves. She handed the Doctor back his coat, noting that he had landed them in the middle of a busy marketplace. He opened the doors for her, bowing with an exaggerated flourish as if she were some sort of nobility. She rolled her eyes at him but played along.

"Venice," he exclaimed to Amy and Rory, who were a bit too busy at looking around in amazement to pay him much attention. "Venezia! La Serenissima! Impossible city. Preposterous city!"

"It was founded by refugees running from Attila the Hun and started out as a small conglomeration of wooden huts in the marsh before becoming one of the most powerful cities in the world," Rey explained, taking in the sights.

"Constantly being invaded, constantly flooding… constantly… Just beautiful! Oh, you gotta love Venice. And so many people did. Byron, Napoleon, Cassanova." He made a face and checked his watch. "That's alright. Casanova doesn't get born for 145 years."

"What a shame," she said genuinely. Reputation aside, he had been fascinating to talk to. Yes, he flirted the way some people breathed, but that wasn't anything new after Jack. Rey was fine with flirting so long as it was harmless. When people started getting mad that they weren't being reciprocated, that was when there was a problem.

"Don't want to run into him. I owe him a chicken," the Doctor said with more distaste than expected.

"You owe Casanova a chicken," Rory asked dubiously.

"Long story. We had a bet."

And official in black robes stopped them, zeroing in on the Doctor as the authority figure of the group. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! Papers, if you please. Proof of residency, current bill of medical inspection."

He patted his coat for the psychic paper. Really, by now he should've known better by now. What did he expect when he actually gave her his coat? Rey slipped it out of the back pocket of her jeans and handed it to him. He checked it briefly, then held it up for the official. "There you go, fella. All to your satisfaction, I think you'll find."

The official bowed deeply. "I am so sorry, Your Holiness. I didn't realize."

"No worries. You were just doing your job."

"What is your job," she asked.

The official bowed to her as well, looking down at the ground rather than at her face. "Checking for aliens, My Lady Marquise. Visitors from foreign lands what might bring the plague with them."

"Oh, that's nice. See where you bring me?" Amy slapped the Doctor's arm. "The plague!"

"Don't worry, Viscountess." The official bowed for a third time. "No, we're under quarantine here, no one comes in, no one goes out, and all because of the grace and wisdom of our patron, Signora Rosanna Calvierri." He pointed to the crest on the box he was carrying.

The Black Plague had reached its peak in Europe in the years 1346-1353. By 1580 it should have died out already. Rey mentioned that last part to the official, who vehemently shook his head. "Not out there. No, Signora Calvierri has seen it with her own eyes. Streets are piled high with bodies, she said."

"Did she now," the Doctor asked curiously.

Rory reached for the psychic paper as the office left them to find someone else to question. "According to this, I am your eunuch!" Rey frowned and glanced at the Doctor. That was unnecessarily mean of him.

"Oh, yeah, I'll explain later," Amy said dismissively, missing the point of Rory's exclamation.

Under the pretense of looking around, the Doctor searched for any sign of the Signora. To be fair though, it wasn't as if they had to make a huge detour. Her school was near the centre of the city, and a number of people gathered to watch what must have been a daily procession. The young women of the school, set up in two neat lines and all wearing white dresses with veils, walked out. They didn't get very far before a black man ran up to them, ignoring the hissed question from the leader. He began to lift the veils up, looking for one girl in particular. "Where's my Isabella," he demanded, fearful and frantic.

"What are you doing," the woman asked. She was a little too calm for the ruckus, more annoyed than taken aback or scared. "Get away from there!"

Guido kept searching. "Isabella! Isabella! It's me!" He found his daughter near the back of the line, but there was no heartfelt reunion. She backed away as if she didn't even recognize him. One of the other girls hissed sharply, and he fell back to the ground in shock.

"Girls, come along," the woman beckoned, and led them away.

The only man in the group pressed his booted foot down on Guido's chest, forcing him to stay on the ground for a moment longer before leaving with an elaborate swish of his coat.

"Isabella! It's me," Guido still called out to his daughter even as two guards lifted him from the ground to escort him away.

"What was that about," Amy asked. The Doctor grabbed Rey's hand and left without a word. "I hate it when he does that!"

He led the way through a narrow passage near the school. "So what happened between you and Amy," she asked as they walked, tracking Guido's movements until they could find him somewhere isolated from other bystanders. She wasn't blind, and the Doctor was hardly one to play couple's counselor if he could help it.

He struggled with himself for an answer, but lucky for him, they soon crossed Guido's path somewhere tucked out of the way. "Who were those girls?"

"I thought everyone knew about the Calvierri school."

"We're new in town," she said. They were still holding hands, and his grip was firm. She felt warmer than usual because of it. And also curious. In one thought she reminded herself to act normal, and in the next she wondered what had happened.

"Parent do all sorts of things to get their children into good schools. They move house, they change religion. So, why are you trying to get her out," the Doctor asked in a whisper.

Guido looked around obviously, double-checking that they were alone. "Something happens in there. Something magical, something evil. My own daughter didn't recognize me. And the girl who pushed me away, her face… like an animal."

The Doctor slung an arm around his shoulders. "I think it's time I met this Signora Calvierri."

Rey paused, causing all three of them to stop. "I should find Amy and Rory." She was worried about them—companions had a tendency to run into trouble when they were on their own, even more so than when they traveled as a group. And in any case, although she tried to close her eyes and pretend that nothing had happened, it was difficult to do so when the Doctor insisted on touching her so casually. The heat of his hand reminded her of how hot it was when the sun possessed him, which reminded her of her realization, and that made her skittish like a newborn fawn.

She left before she could find a reason to stay, like the slightly hurt expression of the Doctor's face, or the way his grip tightened for a fraction of a second before letting go. Putting both out of her mind, she set about tracking down Amy and Rory without any real intention of actually joining them.

There was an obvious tension between the two. Strange, since they were apparently supposed to be getting married in the morning. From what she'd gathered about this point in their lives, the Doctor had basically showed up and derailed their plans. That being said, she had a feeling even if he hadn't shown up, they would still need time to talk and figure out what they were going to do. All he'd done was just made that need more apparent.

They were walking through another narrow passage when she caught up to them. After making sure they hadn't gotten into any trouble yet, she decided to let them be. She stayed close in case anything happened, but she was far enough that she wasn't eavesdropping. The last thing she wanted was to become their third wheel, especially with Amy acting weird around her.

"Flowers, signora," a young girl asked.

She shook her head and kept walking, hoping the silence would help her collect her thoughts. Unfortunately, it only seemed to make more of a mess of them. She couldn't understand why it was so difficult for her to just fall back into step and act normal. People didn't go about declaring their interest the second they realized their feelings—even she knew that. And nothing had really changed except now Rey had a name for what the Doctor made her feel.

Moments later, a piercing scream echoed off the walls. She back ran without hesitating, quickly stumbling across a harrowing sight. The same man from outside the Calvierri school, the one who had stepped on Guido, was bent over the prone body of the flower seller. He had his head buried in her neck, like the mock embrace of a lover. A bead of blood escaped his mouth and trickled down her collar, staining her clothes.

Quiet steps, a habit she maintained even when running—or rather, especially while running—meant he had yet to notice her presence. Rey kicked out, knocking him away from the other girl. He recovered fast, hissing at her through a mouth full of fangs. Then, realizing what was happening, he quickly covered his face with his cape and ran off.

Rory and Amy came rounding around the other corner. Rey tore after Francesco, not wanting to lose him in the alleys. Amy's footsteps echoed behind her, signaling she had joined her in the chase while Rory checked on the flower seller. Francesco slipped around another corner, and she came to an abrupt stop as the ground was cut short by the canal. She grabbed the back of Amy's shirt to pull her back from nearly falling in.

Francesco was nowhere in sight.

With the backdrop of the setting sun, the four of them met up again by the Calvierri school. Rey hung behind at the back with Rory while Amy and the Doctor gushed about their individual discovers. "I just met some vampires," he exclaimed at the same time she shouted "We just saw a vampire!" Their voices overlapped as the spoke, making them both near indecipherable. Together, they jumped up and down with excitement.

"Okay, so…" the Doctor squished Rory's cheeks with both his hands. "First we need to get back in there somehow.

"What?!"

"How do we do that," Amy asked.

"Back in where?!"

"The school," Rey told him. "It's their base of operations, so in order to find out what is going on, we need to investigate more."

"Exactly, Rory, do keep up." He grinned at Rey, who rolled her eyes at his childishness, hiding a sliver of amusement for herself. "Come and meet our new friend."

He led them to Guido's place, a small house for a man of relatively small means, but it was well lived in. She could see traces of him and Isabella in every corner and every belonging, and knew at once that while their life wasn't perfect, they must've been very happy together. A map of the city was laid out on the table, which the Doctor and Amy looked over carefully. Rey studied it for a while, filed it away in her memory, and joined Rory at the back near barrels that smelled suspiciously like gunpowder.

He had been so considerate of her when she started out, it was only fair that she be considerate to him now that their roles were reversed.

"As you saw, there's no clear way in," Guido explained. He'd already gone over his numerous attempts, all failed, to get to Isabella. "The House of Calvierri is like a fortress. But there's a tunnel underneath it, with a ladder and shaft that leads up into the house. I tried to get in one myself, but I hit a trapdoor."

"You need someone on the inside," Amy realized.

"No," the Doctor said definitively.

"You don't even know what I was going to say!"

"You were going to suggest we pretend you're an applicant to get you inside the school, and at night you would go down to open the trapdoor and let us in," Rey summarized briefly. Objectively, it wasn't a bad plan, but she worried about Amy being in there on her own.

"Oh. So you do know what I was going to say."

"Are you insane," Rory asked.

"We don't have another option," she argued.

"They said no, Amy. Listen to them."

"There is another option," Guido added. "I work in the Arsenal. We build the warships for the navy."

"Rory, you might want to get off the barrel of gunpowder," Rey suggested. He slid off slowly and backed away in her direction.

"Most people just nick stationary from where they work," the Doctor said tensely, hands flexing in his lap. "Look, I have a thing about guns and huge quantities of explosives."

"What do you suggest, then? We wait until they turn her into an animal?" Guido turned and angrily poked the fire.

"I could go," she offered. To her surprise, the Doctor shot that idea down as quickly as he had Amy's. She wanted to argue the point—it would be safer for her to go. She had more experience, and she could take the sonic in case anything did happen. But the hard edge to his voice told her that he wasn't going to see reason no matter what she said.

His lack of faith in her abilities was more than a little disheartening.

"I'll be there three, four hours tops," Amy tried again.

"No, no, no. no, no, no. It can't keep happening like this. This is how they go." He sat on the bed, head buried in his hands. After a moment and a deep breath to calm himself, he sat back. "But I have to know. We go together. Say you're my daughter."

"What?! Don't listen to him," Rory protested.

Okay, Rey wasn't going to lie to herself. It hurt that he had chosen Amy instead of her. He didn't even think to send both of them together, just Amy. She tried to convince herself that this was their best option—two new applicants at the same time would draw attention, and it wasn't as if they could pose as related. Francesco might recognize her whereas he had only caught the barest glimpse of Amy. And Amy fit the part of a rich girl better than her in both appearance and acting ability.

Every single reason felt like an excuse to her.

It was her foolish heart that hurt the worst at the idea that he didn't trust her with this. Stupid, stupid, stupid. She'd told herself to act normal and what had she done? She'd gone and thought better of herself than she actually was.

Amy laughed. "Your daughter? You look about nine."

"Brother, then."

"Too weird. Fiancé."

"I'm not having him run around telling people he's your fiancé," Rory protested.

"No. No, you're right," Amy agreed.

"Thank you."

Once again, she missed the root of Rory's discontent. "I mean, they've already seen the Doctor. You should do it."

"Me?"

"Yeah! You can be my brother!" She grabbed him around the neck and rubbed his head playfully with her fist.

The Doctor smiled at their interaction. "Why is him being your brother weird, but with me, it's okay," Rory asked.

"Actually, I thought you were her fiancé," Rey heard Guido say not-so-quietly to the Doctor. She shifted a little bit more away from everyone.

He gave Guido a strange look—a mixture of annoyance, disappointment, and forced nonchalance were warring to see which would win. None of those emotions made sense to her, unless he was disappointed that he wasn't actually Amy's fiancé. That thought made her chest twist painfully—no. Act normal. Don't care. His choices were his.

"This whole thing is mental," Rory complained. "They're vampires, for God's sake."

"Hopefully," she added a little more acerbically than she intended.

"So if they're not vampires…" Amy trained off.

"Makes you wonder what could be so bad it doesn't actually mind us thinking it's a vampire," the Doctor finished.

The night passed fitfully, and no one really slept. Amy and Rory, borrowing some of Isabella's and Guido's old clothes respectively, headed to the Calvierri school in the morning. Guido, after much protest, went to his job like normal. He kept pacing around and glancing back at the gunpowder in a way that it was making both the Doctor and Rey nervous. Rey herself was curled up in a chair by the window, soaking in the warm sunlight. She felt unusually cold, had been since last night.

"They're going to be fine," the Doctor said, mistaking her closed off reserve for worry. He was half right, but she also had confidence that Amy would be okay. Amy was just that sort of girl: capable.

Nodding was her only reply. After a while, she heard the scrape of chair legs against the floor as the Doctor dragged his chair from the table over to her. "Rey… please tell me what's wrong. If it's spoilers or— or if it's Amy and Rory— just tell me and—"

Why would he think she had a problem with Amy and Rory? She had a soft spot for all his companions; he had chosen them for a reason, after all.

She lifted her head to look at him. Ruffled brown hair, a still immaculately pressed shirt and straight bowtie. His face was pinched with worry and his hands were clenching and unclenching by his side like he didn't know what to do with them.

Her chest didn't loosen at the sight. A smile didn't threaten to tug at her lips. She didn't feel the urge to reach out and still his hands. That wasn't what normal Rey did. "I'm fine," she assured him, and she was. She was just being ridiculous earlier, but she was fine. "There were just a few too many thoughts in my head. But I'm fine."

Unconvinced, he opened his mouth to add something, but the door banging open cut him off. In walked an agitated Rory, angry and scared, and rightfully so. Rey checked the angle of the sun. They had a few hours left until it was dark enough they could sneak in unnoticed, and they were long, tension-filled hours.

Guido came home in the late afternoon. At sunset, they climbed into his gondola. He steered them along the canal with quiet precision.

"She'll be fine," the Doctor tried to assure Rory.

"You can promise me that, can you," he snapped back.

Rey stayed quiet, eyes opened and ears strained for any sign they were caught. They left Guido with the boat when they arrived at the entrance of the underground tunnel. The Doctor took the lead, torch in hand to light the way. "Right. Okay, I'll go first. If anything happens to me, take Rey and go back…"

Rory interrupted him abruptly. "What happened? Between you and Amy? You said she kissed you."

"What," Rey asked, louder than she should have. The Doctor and Amy kissed?

"Now," he asked fiercely. "You want to do this now?!" A wooden door stood at the end of the wooden steps, in slightly better shape.

"I have a right to know," Rory said, following him. Rey brought up the rear, glad she wasn't caught in the middle of the two bickering—were they actually bickering?—men. "I'm getting married in 430 years."

They went through the door and down another narrow passage. "She was frightened," the Doctor said. "I was frightened, but we survived, and the relief of it… and so she kissed me."

"And you kissed her back?"

"No, I kissed her mouth," he tried to joke.

"Funny," Rory said, tone implying it was anything but.

"Rory…" The Doctor stopped and turned around, aiming the torch at both the people behind him. Rey squinted through the bright light. The angle and the shadows made it difficult to make out much of anything. "Rory, she kissed me because I was there. It would have been you, it should have been you."

"Yeah."

"Exactly. That's why I brought you here. And in any case, I—" A strong gust blew the torch out, leaving them all in the darkness. "Can we go and see the vampires now, please?"

At a slightly slower pace, they continued onwards. Rey tripped a couple of times when she misjudged the distance between uneven steps, scraping up her shins and knees some. Rory fell completely over a rock in a particularly terribly place, bringing the Doctor down with him. It might've been comical if she could see it properly.

Finally, they reached the trapdoor. The Doctor pushed it open and used Rory as a human ladder to climb up. He returned the favor by helping to pull Rory out. Rey looked up at both of them through the hole in the floor. The distance wasn't so bad, so she hooked her hands on either side, jumped, and pushed herself the rest of the way up.

The Doctor let out a low whistle, to which she responded with an eye roll and a light smack. They were supposed to be quiet, not make a racket to draw a crowd.

"Amy! Where's Amy? I can't see a thing."

"Just as well I brought this, then," Rory said, pulling out a small penlight.

The Doctor pulled out a large electric torch from his inner coat pocket. "Ultraviolet. Portable sunlight."

"Yours is bigger than mine," Rory noted.

"Let's not go there," he said.

She ignored them both and led the way into the courtyard. They could finish their weird, dumb competition later, there was work to be done now.

The school was eerily silent, devoid of even the ordinary night sounds. There was nothing rustling, no bugs chirping. Not even the water from the canal could be heard.

"If we cancel now, we lose the deposit on the village hall, the salsa band…"

"You won't have to cancel," she assured Rory.

The Doctor opened a chest and blanched when he saw the skeletal remains inside. "What happen to them," Rory asked.

"They've had all the moisture taken out of them."

"That's what vampires do, right? They drink your blood and replace it with their own."

She bent down to get a closer look, aiming the Doctor's light to help. The bones looked brittle and much too exposed for the decomposition to be natural. "It's not just blood that's been taken. All the water in this body is gone."

"Why did they die," Rory asked. "Why aren't they like the girls in the school?"

"Maybe not everyone survives the process," the Doctor offered.

Rory started to walk away, worry and frustration gnawing at him. He didn't go far before he stopped and pointed at the Doctor. "You know what's dangerous about you? It's not that you make people take risks. It's that you make them want to impress you. You make it so they don't want to let you down. You have no idea how dangerous you make people to themselves when you're around."

"Who are you," a group of girls asked in unison before the Doctor could respond. They appeared soundlessly, each of them under a different archway.

"We should run," Rey advised. "Now, I think."

They tore down the corridor away from the courtyard. The girls followed them through the school, faster than they looked. The Signora, Francesco, and a second man, Carlo, were together in another hallway as if they had been waiting for them. "Cab for Amy Pond," the Doctor asked. Behind them, the girls caught up and blocked their escape.

"This rescue plan, not exactly watertight, is it," the Signora asked.

The Doctor held out the torch, holding the girls behind them back. Amy, accompanied by another girl that could only be Isabella, ran at them from an intersecting corridor. She called out to Rory, who was equally elated to see she was alright.

"Quickly, through here," Isabella urged, leading them back in the direction she came from. Rey heard the Signora give the order to seal the house as the girls gave chase.

Isabella's route led them back to the underground stairs, exactly where they wanted to go. Guido was still waiting for them at the exit, and the gondola would be their getaway vehicle, not something Rey thought she would even think of a gondola as.

"They're not vampires," Amy exclaimed.

The Doctor soniced the door. "What?!"

"I saw them, I saw her. They're not vampires. They're aliens!"

He chuckled. "Classic!"

"That's good news," Rory exclaimed. "What is wrong with you people?!"

"Well if they're aliens—" Rey's explanation was cut short by the sound of the splintering wood. Their pursuers were breaking through the door to get to them.

The Doctor grabbed her hand, urging her to run faster. She was the slowest among them. "Come on, move!" He released her and ushered her towards Rory while he stood his ground, brandishing the UV flashlight like a weapon. "Keep moving! Come on, guys."

Dawn was beginning to break when they pushed through the final door separating them from the home stretch. "Quickly. Get out. Quick!" Isabella reared back the second she was exposed to sunlight, hands coming up to block her eyes.

Rey doubled back for her, but the Doctor was closer. "Oh. Come on, run!"

"I can't!" Before either of them could do anything, she was dragged back inside, the door slamming shut.

Rey reached for the door handle. There was a brief moment of disconnect before her brain registered the pain wracking her body. Electricity coursed through her like water through the canals of the city. Every muscle tensed, and every joint locked in place. It was worse than being tasered; if this was what electroconvulsive therapy felt like, she was never more grateful that it hadn't been part of her treatment than she was now.

One of the orderlies played had once a joke on her. For two months, he had been the one tasked with bringing her food. Every time he came around, if he came at all, he would always tell her that they were going to start her on shock therapy any day now to "electrocute the crazy out of her." He had even wheeled her to the room when she had been half drugged out of her mind, machinery all set up and ready to go. Rey's resulting panic attack was so bad, she actually threw up and passed out. When she woke up strapped to the bed, she nearly believed that he had been right before Dr. Usher came and assured her nothing had happened

She still saw that orderly around sometimes. He had been among the hospital staff transferred to Nevermore.

Everything was sore when she woke up, even her brain. She probably hadn't had a seizure though, so at least there was that. By some miracle, she hadn't bitten her tongue off or cracked her teeth either. Something nice was happening to her head, like someone was softly carding their fingers through her hair.

Still half-asleep, she thought back to the way the Doctor had done the same after everything that had happened on Akhaten. It had felt nice then too. She never knew that a simple action could feel so good.

When she opened her eyes, she found herself lying on the bed at Guido's house with the Doctor's coat draped over her like a blanket. The pressure was gone—or maybe it had just been her imagination and never there to begin with. The Doctor sat by the bed, arms crossed. His brow was furrowed with worry, contrasting the way his green eyes shone with anger. "You are never doing that again," he told her firmly.

"I'll try not to." Her tongue felt heavy in her mouth. She tested for sores, but the damage to the inside of her mouth was minimal. "But no promises."

His frown deepened as she pushed herself up into a sitting position. Rory was tending to Amy's neck and checking her vitals. Guido sat stony faced and quiet in the background. "Have we figured out what they are yet?"

The Doctor shook his head, quickly bringing her up to speed on what he'd garnered from his meeting with the Signora. She didn't like that he'd went off on his own, but given the circumstances, she decided to let it slide this once. At least he was briefing them now instead of keeping it to himself.

He slapped his own cheeks in an attempt to get his brain working faster. "I need to think. Come on brain, think, think. Think!"

"If they're fish people, it explains why they hate the sun," Amy offered.

He held up a hand to shush her. "Stop talking, brain thinking. Hush."

"It's the school thing I don't understand," Rory admitted.

The Doctor repeated the same thing he said to Amy.

"I say we taking the fight to them," Guido said. His voice was hard to mask the pain he was in.

"Ah-ah-ah!" The Doctor pointed at him.

"What?"

Rory shushed him.

"So her planet died," Rey said, hoping that speaking aloud would help her process her jumbled thoughts better. "And some managed to escape through a crack in space and time to here. They closed off the city to maintain control and one by one started changing girls into more Sisters of the Water…" The Doctor nodded, confirming everything she said to be true. "But they come from the sea... That's simple then. If they can't survive for long on land, all they have to do is change the environment to make it more hospitable."

"She said 'I shall bend the heavens to save my race,'" the Doctor recited. "Bend the heavens… bend… the heavens…"

"She's going to sink Venice," Rey concluded.

"She's… She's going to since Venice," Guido repeated questioningly.

"And repopulate it with the girls she's transformed," the Doctor added.

"You can't repopulate somewhere with just women," Rory said. "You need… blokes."

"She's got blokes," Amy pointed out.

"Where?"

"In the canal. She said to me, 'there are 10,000 husbands waiting in the water'."

"Only the male offspring survived the journey here," the Doctor realized. "So she's got 10,000 children swimming in the canals, waiting for Mum to make them some compatible girlfriends. Ew. I mean, I've been around a bit, but, really, that's… that's… Ew." Something clattered loudly above them. "The people upstairs are very noisy."

"There are only two stories," Rey reminded him. "That would be the Sisters of the Water on the roof."

"I was hoping you wouldn't say that."

The wood creaked. "It's the vampires," Rory asked, looking up at the ceiling.

"Not vampires," Rey corrected lightly. "Space fish."

"Can you run," the Doctor asked her quietly. She nodded. Everything was sore, but it was nothing she couldn't handle.

A loud thump, followed by the sound of breaking glass came next. Outside the window, they could see more of the school girls gazing in. Everyone jumped to their feet, readying for action. The Doctor pulled out the UV light while Guido crossed himself. "Aren't we on the second floor," Rory asked nervously.

The window broke, allowing the girls to reach inside. They tried to climb through, but the Doctor held them back with the torch. He tossed Rey the sonic, which she used to force them to reveal their true selves.

Guido gasped and reared back. "What's happened to them?"

"There's nothing left of them," the Doctor said sadly. "They've been fully converted. Blimey, fish from space have never been so… buxom. Okay… Move. Come on."

She switched the sonic off and handed it back to him. Amy led them downstairs, Rory at her heels. Guido brought up the rear, taking the UV light from the Doctor to hold off their pursuers.

"Go, go, go, guys." The Doctor urged Amy and Rory on. "Keep moving, go, go, go!"

Guido stopped before the front door, waiting until Rey was clear before locking it behind her. "Get her away from the door, Doctor."

She pounded on the wood. "I know what you're planning—" She knew he'd been mulling over the idea since she woke up and saw how he kept eyeing the barrels. "Don't do it!"

"Rey, get back—"

"He'd going to blow the house," she told the Doctor.

He gritted his teeth, fighting an internal war in his mind. "There's nothing we can do. He's made his decision." He pulled her with him, and they cleared the blast zone just in time before the explosion went off. The air pressure knocked them both clean off their feet to the ground. Rey's ears rang so loud, she couldn't hear anything else. The Doctor's body was over hers, protecting her from the brunt of the shockwave.

He was mouthing something, probably yelling. Slowly, the ringing faded and her vision cleared enough that she could make out what he was saying. "—kay? Rey? Are you okay? Are you hurt?"

"I'm fine. Are you?"

He heaved a sigh of relief and nodded before helping her up. Her gaze caught what was left of the smoking house. Small fires burned through the torn apart wood, and she couldn't help but wonder how much of Guido's body survived.

"We should go," he said sadly. Soon, people would come to investigate, to help put out the fires and see if anything was salvageable.

She nodded and followed him back into town. Amy and Rory anxiously waited for them out of sight. Both visibly relaxed when they saw the Doctor and Rey. Guido's absence spoke for itself, and they could still see the smoke from the blast.

In the distance, Rey heard what she could only describe as the sounds of panicking people. Dark vapor and heavy smoke were rapidly blotting out the sky. Lighting crackled, thunder boomed, and a pouring rain came falling down like a curtain.

"Rosanna's initiating the final phase," the Doctor noted.

"We need to stop her. Come on," Amy urged.

"No, no. Get back to the TARDIS."

"You can't stop her on your own," she argued.

"We don't discuss this! I tell you to do something, Amy, and you do it. Huh?" Amy stormed off. Rory thanked him quickly and went after her. "You should go with them," he said to Rey.

"Not happening." Before he could say anything else, she hurried off in the direction of the Calvierri school. The bell tower that was the center of the disastrous weather was right across the road, and the people had quickly taken note of that and fled. The streets were barren, which was actually helpful in this case as there was no one blocking their way.

It wasn't hard to figure out where the controls were in the throne room. The large chair was the only thing in it. Rey popped the back open, revealing complicated circuitry she had never seen or read about before. The Doctor pulled out his screwdriver.

The Signora stood, basking in the accumulation of her years of hard work. "This must be your Rey. You're too late. Such determination… just to save one city. Hard to believe it's the same man that let an entire race turn to cinders and ash. Did you know that about him," she asked her.

"Yes," Rey answered truthfully.

"Ah. Well, now you can both watch as my people take their new kingdom."

"The girls have gone, Rosanna," the Doctor told her.

"You're lying."

"Shouldn't we be dead? Hmm?" He gave one last attempt to convince her to help as she turned to walk away. "There are 200,000 people in this city."

"So save them," she said heartlessly, and left them to die.

Rey ran out of the throne room and onto the balcony. If the Doctor knew how to circumvent the controls, he would have done it by now. The bell tolled loudly, apparently giving him an idea since he grabbed her hand and led her back inside. Amy and Rory burst in moments later, soaking wet and in agreement that their place was here instead of in the safety of the TARDIS.

"Get out," the Doctor yelled. "We need to stabilize the storm."

"We're not leaving you," Rory said firmly.

"Right. So one minute it's 'You make people a danger to themselves,' the next it's 'We're not leaving you!' But if one of you gets squashed or blown up or eaten, who gets…"

Rey gripped the throne for dear life as the earth began to shake. It was funny, and by funny she meant not amusing at all, how her brain could differentiate between earthquakes and every other sort of tremors. She was fine in the TARDIS, and other kinds of space turbulence was becoming the norm for her. But earthquakes, whether they were on the actual Earth or an alien planet, still set her teeth on edge.

"What was that," Rory asked from where he had fallen to the ground.

The Doctor quickly pushed himself to his feet and checked on her. "Nothing. Bit of an earthquake. Just a small one really, nothing to worry about."

"An earthquake," Amy echoed.

Rey knew she was pale. She was also breaking out into cold sweats and trembling slightly, but those were probably a side effect of her recent electrocution and almost getting blown up. Still, she forced herself to her feet, relying partly on the Doctor's firm grip on her arms to keep her steady. His right thumb rubbed those comforting circles into her inner wrist again.

"If you manipulate the elements a certain way, you can trigger an earthquake," she explained, focusing on facts to keep her grounded. "But that's not the worrisome part."

"No?"

"No," the Doctor confirmed. "Worry about the tidal waves caused by the earthquake." He kept his gaze on her, but she nudged him to the chair. They needed to concentrate right now on stopping the Signora. "Right, Rosanna's throne is the control hub. But she's locked the program, so tear out every single wire and circuit in the throne. Go crazy. Hit it with a stick, anything. We need it to shut down and reroute control to the secondary hub, which I'm guessing will also be the generator."

She stayed behind with Amy and Rory while he ran to the bell tower. There was no way she could make the climb up there in time with the shape her body was in, but she could wreak havoc on a simple chair.

Outside, the storm raged on, growing louder and bigger by the minute. All the electricity—the lightning, the charged particles in the air, the sparks from the ripped out wires—was starting to get to her. Every flash chipped away at her nerves. She knew she was flinching, and it must've been bad if even Amy and Rory noticed, but she couldn't stop herself.

When they had destroyed all they could, and Amy had even torn the legs off the throne for good measure, they ran back through the school and out the main gates. Rory spotted the Doctor atop the bell tower. He was scaling the side using a thick cable from who knew where in order to reach the large sphere at the top.

"Come on! Come on!" Amy and Rory cheered as he reached the generator and opened it. Seconds later the rain stopped, the clouds blew away like leaves in the wind, and birds even began to sing.

The couple next to her laughed and hugged fiercely in their relief. Rey spotted the Signora in the distance, face dark with despair, and followed her to a nearby quay. She struggled with her perception filter attached beneath her skirt until it finally gave out. Pulling off her gloves and stripping down to her chemise, the Signora walked along the plank near the edge of the canal, which had begun to bubble.

"Rosanna!"

The Doctor joined them, just as drenched as Rey was.

"One city to save an entire species. Was that so much to ask?"

He stayed by her side. "I told you, you can't go back and change time. You mourn but you live. I know, Rosanna, I did it."

"Tell me, Doctor… can your conscience carry the weight of another dead race? Remember us. Dream of us." With those final words, she let herself drop into the canal.

"No… No!" Both of them ran forward, but it was too late. Soon the bubbling stopped and Rosanna was gone.

As was often the trend, the walk back to the TARDIS was more subdued than the walk from it. The townspeople around them were cleaning up after the storm, complaining about the suddenness and severity of it while celebrating how quickly it had passed. It was a fair day where not too many lives were lost, but the losses they did suffer hung over them. Compared to the wide-eyed fascination and excitement they all had when arriving in the city, leaving it was almost gloomy.

"Now, then, what about you two, eh? Next stop Leadworth Register Office? Maybe I can give you away," the Doctor joked halfheartedly.

"It's fine," Rory said. "Drop me back where you found me. I'll just say you've…"

"Stay… with us," Amy asked carefully. "Please? Just for a bit. I want you to stay."

"Fine with me," the Doctor said. Rey nodded in agreement, shivering slightly in her still damp clothes. She had started this adventure soaked, and that was how she ended it. Talk about full circle.

"Yeah? Yes, I would like that."

"Nice one." Amy kissed him and unlocked the TARDIS doors. "I will pop the kettle on. Hey, look at this. Got my spaceship, got my boys, got Rey… My work here is done."

Rory scoffed behind her back and looked to the others. "We are not her boys."

The Doctor clasped a hand on his shoulder. "Well, you might be, but I'm not! If anything, I'm Rey's."

She nearly tripped over the step in the doorway.

"Listen to that," she heard him say.

"What? All I can hear is…"

She wasn't surprised when she opened her eyes and found herself back inside her room at Nevermore. This had happened before. More than once, in fact. She could spend weeks, even months at a time with the Doctor, but she always came back here in the end, as if she had never left.

Her limbs felt heavy and weak as she pushed herself up into a sitting position, legs swung over the side of the bed. They were stiff, not sore, but uncooperative like they hadn't been moved in a while. That, too, was a common occurrence after she woke up. When she woke up, she found that only a few hours or days had passed, but her body always felt like it had been still and asleep for longer.

Her journal was open on the mattress next to her, pages a little wrinkled. She was almost done with this one, her third since meeting the Doctor. All the notebooks they gave her were identical, but she made sure to mark the inside cover with the volume number.

It was always so quiet in her room. Other than the sounds she made herself, silence was her only companion. She had the area memorized like the back of her hand; knew every small dip in the wall, every spot of the floor that would creak if stepped on, every scratch and dent and crack.

Or maybe not. Speaking of cracks, there was a new one on the ceiling above her bed. She had no idea what they were doing upstairs, but occasionally one would form while she was asleep, usually on the ceiling or, less commonly, on the floor beneath her bed. This newest one wasn't particularly big, maybe a centimeter wide and barely five long.

It wasn't so bad, she supposed. Sometimes, counting the cracks were the only thing that put her to sleep, and now she had one more to add to the queue.

Rey closed her eyes. She had no idea if it was day or night, what day of the week it was or what month of the year. Every time she came back to Nevermore, she stayed for a while, and she would only jump back to the Doctor when she rested. She tried to will herself to sleep now. Anything to get back sooner.

So I have a small confession to make: I finished writing this pretty soon after the last chapter went out, and then it sat in my documents unedited for weeks... Thanks for sticking by me guys. Hopefully the next chapter won't take as long. Feedback is always welcome, and feel free to come chat with me on tumblr anytime!